Monday, March 10, 2008

Look to Eucharist for Immortality, Pope tells youth

VATICAN CITY, MARCH 9, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Those looking for the fountain of life should look to the Eucharist, the only true source of immortality, says Benedict XVI.

The Pope said this today upon celebrating a Mass marking the 25th anniversary of the San Lorenzo International Center, attended by an international group of 200 young people.

Pope John Paul II inaugurated the San Lorenzo International Center, located near St. Peter's Basilica, on March 13, 1983. During the inauguration the Polish Pope expressed the hope that the center become "a forge for the formation of authentic young Christians who are capable of bearing coherent witness to the Gospel in today's world."

Benedict XVI put aside his text for the homily and offered a meditation on the meaning of life and death in light of this Sunday’s Gospel on the resurrection of Lazarus.

The human being is not only a biological being, the Pope explained, speaking at the Church of San Lorzenzo in Piscibus, which forms part of the center.

“Although he is part of the this great biocosmos, man transcends it because, certainly, man is always man with all his dignity, even if he is in a comatose state, even if he is an embryo; but if he only lives biologically not all of the possibilities of his being will be realized, which open new dimensions,” he said.

The first dimension is that of knowledge, the Holy Father continued, a knowledge that in man, as distinct from animals, is identified with a “thirst for the infinite.”

We all aspire to “drink from the fountain of life itself,” he said, and to do so we entrust ourselves to the “second dimension of human nature,” which is love.

Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron

St. John of the Cross

Dark Night of the Soul (2.2:3)...

"...the devil causes many to believe in vain visionsand false prophecies; and strives to make them presumethat God and the saints are speaking with them; and they often trust their own fancy. And the devil is also accustomed, in this state, to fill them with presumption and pride, so that they become attracted by vanity and arrogance, and allow themselves to be seen engaging in outward acts which appear holy, such as raptures and other manifestations. Thus they become bold with God, and lose holy fear, which is the key and the custodian of all the virtues; and in some of these souls so many are the falsehoods and deceits which tend to multiply, and so inveterate do they grow, that it is very doubtful if such souls will return to the pure road of virtue and true spirituality."